


There's Just You

by anorienparker



Category: Firefly
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-24
Updated: 2011-08-24
Packaged: 2017-10-23 00:34:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/244297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anorienparker/pseuds/anorienparker





	There's Just You

Jayne didn’t give a flying fuck about the real-men-don’t-cry rule. Oh, he believed it a year ago. Lived by it, actually. Held it in high regard, right up there with the never-go-to-bed-without-cleaning-you-guns-first rule and the one that said you never-for-any-reason-go-into-a-bar-without-at-least-three-knives one.

But that was before Simon. Before he’d started sexin’ the doctor up real good every night, then somehow along the way, without really meaning to, managed to fall in love with him.

And that was before some idjit crew Mal had pissed off a few years before had found their way onto Serenity and got their hands on Simon and River. They took River, and Simon, of course, fought with everything in him to protect her. He was outnumbered, though, six to one, and even then, they might have had a chance if one of the men hadn’t drugged River before she could react.

They’d hurt Simon bad, left his broken and bleeding body just inside the cargo bay where Mal would see him right off when he, Jayne and Zoe got back from picking up their latest haul on the other side of town, and took off with an unconscious River.

When Jayne saw Simon laying there, his heart literally stopped. Those fancy doctors would tell you that a man’s heart can’t just _stop_ like that, but Jayne knew better. He was the first to reach Simon, but there was just so much blood he couldn’t figure out where to start even if he could remember what he was supposed to be doing.

All he could remember was that the last thing he’d told Simon before he’d left the ship. He’d said he didn’t know if they should stay together or not. They’d been arguing about something stupid, and they’d both been tired and on edge and when Simon pointed out that though Jayne didn’t sleep around any more, he wouldn’t go so far as to promise he wouldn’t do so in the future, Jayne had panicked. And Jayne, hothead that he was, said he didn’t do commitments and that maybe he’d just stop at the local whorehouse on the way back and see what he’d been missing since Simon had kept him so occupied these last few months with his constant demands on his time and libido. With that, Jayne had turned on his heel and left a devastated looking Simon behind.

Jayne had wanted to turn back and say he was sorry before he even made it to the door, but Mal and Wash and everyone else had heard him and his pride simply wouldn’t let him admit that he’d said things he didn’t mean or had made threats he never intended - or wanted - to carry out.

Now, as Jayne stared at his lover, who looked more dead than alive, Mal leaned down real close to Simon’s mouth, then shook his head, saying he couldn’t hear any sounds of breathing. At that, Jayne literally roared. The sound echoed off the rafters and it was a sound no one on Serenity would forget as long as they lived.

He couldn’t give up though, not on Simon. Jayne picked his lover up in his arms and somehow managed to breathe for him as he rushed to the infirmary and laid him down on a gurney strapped to the wall. Over Mal’s protests that it was too late, there was nothing else they could do, Jayne snapped off orders to everyone, and to their credit, even Mal’s, once he saw how much Jayne needed this, they all did as Jayne ordered.

The whole while Jayne breathed for Simon and pressed down on his chest again and again. Somehow, he remembered all the times Simon told him about his days in college and med school, about how he’d patched up some hundreds of people, from civilians to soldiers to thieves and prisoners. Jayne remembered every word. And despite everything, he was able to think, to know what needed to be done.

Without missing a beat, he took over, and to Jayne’s everlasting gratefulness, Mal let him, just this once.

“Zoe, you, Wash and Mal go find River. When Simon wakes up, he’s going to be worried about her.” Zoe and Mal exchanged a look that said they were pretty sure Simon wasn’t going to wake up at all, but left anyway. Whether Simon lived or died, they couldn’t just leave River behind.

“Kaylee, you get some of that gauze-stuff and find the bleeding and stop it . Shephard, you start one of them IVs.”

As a tearful Kaylee and Shephard went to work, Jayne breathed for Simon again, then leaned in, putting his lips close to his lover’s ear.

“Iffin’ you leave me now, doc, I’ll never forgive you. It’d be like you givin’ up on us, like you didn’t think we was good enough to fight for. Now buck up and breathe for yourself, so I can patch you up, you gorram fool!”

The room was perfectly silent except for Kaylee who let out a soft sob.

Then suddenly, out of nowhere, there it was. The sound of a shallow, ragged breath. It sounded wet and painful and it was the most beautiful sound Jayne had ever heard in his life. It was followed by another, then another, and then Simon was breathing on his own.

There was no time for celebration though, and Jayne damn well knew it. He simply kissed Simon’s forehead, then went to work cutting off his clothes and very gently cleaning the blood away so he could see what was wrong.

It took him nearly two hours, but he stitched up each and every wound. Book, who had learned a little about medicine over the years had remembered that Jayne and Simon shared the same blood type and hooked them up so Simon could get a transfusion of Jayne’s blood. When there was nothing else to be done, Jayne asked them to leave.

By the time the others came back with a still half-drugged River, Jayne had strapped two hospital beds together and was laying beside Simon, holding his hand.

“What the....?” Mal stopped short when he saw the two. He’d honestly thought Simon had been dead or close enough to it so as not to matter.

“He can’t rest good unless I’m next to him,” Jayne said defensively. “Don’t you ever listen?”

Mal could only shake his head in wonder. River drifted in behind him and looked at her brother with an oddly calm expression. “I killed the others,” she said evenly as she reached out and touched Simon’s cheek, then smiled at Jayne. “I killed the bad men and you saved a good one. He was dead, you know.” With that, she was gone, having apparently decided she was needed elsewhere.

Mal and Jayne were silent for a moment, their eyes meeting across Simon’s unconscious body. Jayne looked exhausted and Mal could see that it was taking everything he had to just to hold himself together.

“Call if you need us,” he said, and headed toward the door. He was just about to step out when he heard a sound coming from Jayne he’d never heard before. It sounded like he couldn’t breathe, or like a cough, or a maybe even a sob was caught in his throat. Mal paused, hung his head, then left Jayne alone with Simon. He’d known there were feelings there somewhere, but he’d never expected to witness them himself. Jayne played most things close to the vest, but Mal supposed it was all too much just then and something slipped out.

It was an endless night. Jayne stayed glued to Simon’s side talking to him for hours, kissing his cheek, his lips, his neck, saying he was sorry for what he’d said earlier and trying desperately to remind him of all the things he had to live for. He finally fell into an exhausted sleep late the next morning.

When he awoke a few hours later, Simon’s eyes were open, staring up at the ceiling.

Jayne swallowed back the lump in his throat and looked up at the ceiling as well. “I know I ain’t nothin’ to look at, but I’m a site better lookin’ than that ceilin’ especially with them water stains in the corners,” he said with his typical romantic turn of a phrase.

Simon turned to look at Jayne, searching his face for answers. He didn’t remember the attack...the last thing he could remember was Jayne saying he was going to go to a whorehouse and walking away. Now, he only knew that he hurt all over for some reason, he was in the infirmary and Jayne was beside him again....and his eyes were red and swollen and there where what looked suspiciously like tear tracks down his cheeks.

But of course, that couldn’t be right. Jayne Cobb didn’t cry. Oh, Simon knew there was a side to him that the other’s didn’t see, but he wasn’t the crying type. He was too ridiculously stubborn to let himself show that much emotion. He showed more of himself when he was alone with Simon than he ever had with anyone else, but still....he’d never cried before.

“Why are you here? I thought you were in that whor..in town? And why is everything hurting?”

Jayne propped his head up on one arm and squeezed Simon’s hand. “Everything’s hurting because some gorram bunch of thugs tryin’ to get revenge on Mal cut you up pretty bad,” he said. “They took River, but...”

He put his hand on Simon’s chest, knowing he’d be trying to dart up off the bed at that, and sure enough that’s exactly what he did. “But she’s back now and she’s safe. You nearly died tryin’ to save her. And I was in town, but I came back after we picked up what we came here for. I didn’t go to no whorehouse, Simon, and I ain’t plannin’ to neither, not ever again.”

Simon tried not to let the relief show on his face. He turned away from Jayne and looked back up at the ceiling. His breath caught in his throat, however, when a large, calloused hand moved under the sheet to rest on his bare stomach.

“Ain’t no good with words,” Jayne said quietly. “But to answer your other question, I’m here ‘cause there ain’t nowhere else I wanna be. You and me, we’re good together, Simon and what I said earlier....well, you know I get stupid sometimes and let my mouth run when...”

Simon turned his head to look at Jayne again, seeing how difficult this was for him. “Jayne, _bee-jway_ *. You don’t have to explain yourself.”

Jayne’s face darkened and his shoulders visibly tensed. Any sane person would have been afraid of him when he looked like that, but Simon simply smiled and lifted his hand to touch the other man’s face. As much as Jayne hated to admit it, he liked those soft touches. No one had ever been so... _careful_ with him before. To everyone else he was just the muscle when they needed something done or the cock when some whore wanted to be filled. But since the first time he’d pushed Simon up against the wall just outside of his bunk and kissed him, Simon had treated him like he mattered.

Long fingers brushed over his goatee and then back, over his jawline where dark, coarse stubble had already started to grow out over the previous never-ending night.

Jayne’s hand moved over Simon’s stomach in small circles, then came to rest over his hip. When he put his hand at just the right angle and bent his fingers around Simon’s hip, he could hold him still. It was handy when they were having sex, soothing when they were just lying next to one another in bed. Simon said it made him feel safe and warm and like he could just forget everything in the world for a while except for Jayne.

After a moment’s hesitation, Jayne moved closer and rested his head over Simon’s heart. “Thought I’d lost you,” he said softly as Simon wrapped one arm around his shoulders and held him as tightly as he could, which wasn’t much, given his weakened condition. But for Jayne, it was enough.

He closed his eyes and listened to the now steady beat of his lover’s heart. It was the sweetest sound he could imagine hearing.

Most people would never imagine Jayne Cobb needing comfort. He was usually either offering it, or making it so someone needed it. But he, like everyone else in the universe, needed comforting too now and then. Simon knew this and never made him feel bad or ashamed about that little fact.

“Thing is,” Jayne said after a moment, “is that I do have to explain myself. I didn’t think I knew how to do this whole commitment-thing but then it hit me that there wasn’t nobody I wanted now....nobody but you, and that I’d been doin’ the commitment-thing for months now.”

Simon twisted his fingers around and combed them through the short, dark hair on the back of Jayne’s neck. “Yeah. I guess we both have. I’m sorry I pushed for more. I can be perfectly happy with the way things are, Jayne. We don’t have to change anything.”

“Yes, we do,” Jayne sighed, then looked up at Simon, seeing the worry there. “Simon Tam, I love you and I don’t give a damn who knows it. So I want to give you a commitment and I want one from you too, all public-like and legal.”

Simon blinked and wondered if someone had given him too many pain killers because suddenly his mind seemed a little foggy. “Er.....public like and legal?”

“Captains can legally marry people you know.”

Simon licked his lips and tried to make sense of everything. He wasn’t quite sure what was happening. “Jayne, are you asking me to marry you because I nearly died? Or because I might still die? Is there something you’re not telling me?”

Jayne rolled his eyes. “You know, Doc, for someone so smart, you can be a real idijit sometimes. I’m askin’ cause I love you, bao bay**”

Simon’s mouth suddenly felt dry. Jayne Cobb was proposing to him? They’d nearly broken up the day before, or so Simon had thought, and now....they were talking about getting married?

Jayne mistook Simon’s hesitation for uncertainty. “I know you can do better, but, I just thought....”

“Yes, I’ll marry you and no, there is no better, not for me. There’s just you.”

Jayne stopped mid sentence and his fingers on Simon’s hip tightened. “Is that you or the meds talking? Cause we both know you could have...”

Simon laughed softly. “It’s all me. Now call our captain and see if he can marry us.”

Jayne did just that, hitting the intercom button and asking Mal to hurry down to the infirmary. When Mal arrived a few minutes later he expected to see a dead or at least half-dead Simon and a broken hearted Jayne. Instead, he found the two men wrapped around one another in the infirmary bed, so lost in a kiss they didn’t even hear him when he came stumbling in thinking he was going to have to pull Jayne away from Simon’s corpse.

He was quite happy with what he found instead.

An hour later, with the entire crew on hand, Mal presented the newlywed couple. When their first kiss as husband and husband seemed like it wasn’t ever going to end, River gave a little giggle and Kaylee moved just a bit closer as if she was trying to get a better look at what might be going on underneath the sheet that still covered them. It was at that point Mal thought it prudent to usher everyone else out of the room and leave the newlyweds alone.

Though Simon was still hurt and weak, Jayne made their honeymoon a night to remember. As he spooned behind his husband and slowly, gently slipped inside him, Simon looked back over his shoulder with those serious, sweet, depthless blue eyes, and Jayne wondered how he could ever have even doubted something so beautiful.

.

*bee-jway - shut up

** bao bay - sweetheart


End file.
